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So the Great British Bake Off is over for another – Wednesday nights won’t be the same again! I was really pleased that Nadiya won though, she was my favourite going into the final and really excelled with her 3 bakes. A very worth winner and so humble too. Was anyone not crying in that final scene??

I wanted to pull out all the stops for my final bake for the Great Bloggers Bake-Off, and loved the idea of a three-tiered classic British cake. I asked Rob what he’d like and lemon drizzle was the answer – can’t say no to that!

This gluten-free lemon cake really vamps up the lemon, and is deliciously easy to make and moist when done. It’s very well complemented by the lemon curd filling (keep reading), but works just as well as a standalone cake, without any filling or frosting. And it’s one of those great bakes where you can’t even tell it’s gluten free!

Method– beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy
– add the almonds, and beat in the eggs, one at a time
– add the lemon juice, zest and milk and beat again until smooth
– sieve in the flour and baking powder, and gently fold in until all combined
– split between 3 greased, lined tins – a 4-inch round, a 6-inch round, and an 8-inch round
– bake at 180 degrees C until the cakes are springy to touch and starting to come away from the sides of the tine. If you’re not sure then check with an inserted skewer, which should come out clean.
Each cake will need a different amount of time. Check first after around 20 minutes to see if the first is done, if not give another 5 minutes. The middle will take around 30-35 minutes, and the larger around 45 minutes. The time is very dependent on your oven and tin so keep an eye on them! Once you’ve taken the smaller one out, check the other two at least every 10 minutes, if not more often.
– Prepare the lemon drizzle by mixing the lemon juice and sugar. Microwave for 20-30 second until all the sugar is dissolved
– Once each cake is removed from the oven, prick small holes all over the top with a skewer or cocktail stick, and generously spoon over the lemon drizzle. Leave to cool fully in the tin.

I took a great tip from Nadiya on the show and popped the cakes in the freezer once cool, (wrapped in baking paper) for an hour or so before slicing in half and levelling the tops. It really did make it much easier – no cracking and much less crumbs.

Whilst the cakes were cooling and freezing I made the lemon curd – as this did take quite some time to cool as well. I used Delia’s recipe as a starter – but halved it (3 jars of lemon curd seemed a bit excessive!), and upped the cornflour to give a thicker set that would hold in the cakes. Maybe a bit of a blonde moment but I’d never realised that lemon curd was made mostly of eggs! I would say though that it is really easy to make and waaay better than shop-bought stuff, I’d highly recommend trying it!

Method
– in a large saucepan, beat together the eggs then add the remaining ingredients
– put on a medium heat and whisk continuously for 7 – 8 minutes until it starts to thicken. At this stage cook for another minute, before transferring to a bowl to cool. It will continue to thicken as it cools as well.

As the curd was cooling I went onto the next step. Nadiya had made marshmallow fondant look and sound so easy (“I make it all the time…!”), so I thought I’d give it a go. Well I’ll be honest. I’d like to meet Nadiya and introduce her to ready-to-roll fondant. It’ll save hours and countless amounts of kitchen cleaning!

Needless to say my attempt was rather less than successful. The online methods I read in advance made it sound relatively easy, however completely failed to mention that it is the stickiest substance ever made by man. Seriously, super glue has nothing on this stuff!

The other downside about marshmallow fondant is that it uses a lot of icing sugar. Add that to the sugar in the marshmallows and you’re practically bouncing off the walls with every bite! I’d put in as much sugar as the recipe recommended and it was still nowhere near a fondant consistency, I was struggling to see how this would ever roll out. Additionally I was starting to run out of time – it was nearing midnight and I wanted to get the cake assembled at least that night! So I improvised and turned it into a marshmallow frosting – with the simple addition of a little more water and lemon juice. The good thing about this frosting is that it keeps well (in a sealed container), and if it starts to harden up before you’ve used it all, it can easily be ‘melted’ back down again by popping in the microwave.

Another grumble about these marshmallow icings is that I found it rather tricky to locate all-white marshmallows in the UK shops. I went to a good 5 or 6 big high street retailers / supermarkets, and was just about to give up when I found what I needed in The Range. Really though, does anyone know why they come in pink and white in the first place?!

Method
– put the marshmallows, lemon juice and water in a large bowl. Microwave on 30 second intervals, stirring in between, until the marshmallows are fully melted to a smooth paste
– add the icing sugar and beat well to a smooth consistency (no lumps)
– the consistency should be thin enough to spread, but thick enough to hold its shape without dripping (hold the spoon upside down over the bowl to check). If it’s too thick, add a little more water and beat again, if it’s too thin, add a little more icing sugar. Once ready use straight away, or keep in the fridge in a sealed container until you need to use. Microwave to melt back to a spreadable consistency on removing from the fridge.

With the lemon curd filling and marshmallow frosting finally ready the cakes could be assembled. I layered up with lemon curd in the centre of each tier, and marshmallow frosting between the tiers and all round the sides. After refrigerating for half an hour to set the first layer, I added a second layer of marshmallow frosting to ensure a good thick coating.

As the weather in the UK has recently taken a turn for the chillier, I decided to theme the decorations with an autumnal twist. To go with this rustic look I dimpled the frosting all over to give a more weathered effect.

The leaf and flower decorations I made from coloured (normal) fondant – no more marshmallow icings for me! I may be blowing my own trumpet but I love how these marbled autumn leaves turned out. They were really simple to make too – I started with some green, yellow, orange, red and brown fondant, and mixed together in varying proportions, rolling out while they were only part combined. I used a leaf plunger cutter to get the veined and pronged leaves.

The marshmallow frosting stayed quite sticky so it was easy to attach the decorations the next day. Starting with some yellow flowers (a nod to the lemony inside), I arranged the leaves in an ombre graduating colour pattern down the cake. To finish – what showstopper is complete without a little sparkle – gold soft pearls around the base, in the flower centres and amongst the leaves.

Despite my various doubts (and wanting to give up!) in making this cake, I’m so pleased with how it turned out. Everything came together perfectly in the end and I’ll be honest – it tasted amazing! The homemade lemon curd had such a great zing, I want to put this in all my cakes going forward 🙂 I’m less enamoured with the marshmallow frosting – it really does taste just like marshmallows, which personally I’m not a fan of on a cake. I’ll stick with buttercream and ready-to-roll fondant from now, thank-you-very-much.

The inside of the cake had a perfect wow as well – not to brag but look at those layers!

Although I’ve not been able to participate every week this year, I’ve really enjoyed being a part of the Great Bloggers Bake Off again. As always massive thanks to Jenny for being an amazing organiser. Please click the banner below to visit her blog and for more information on the bloggers bake-off.

Semi-final week in GBBO so it follows that chocolate week comes to the Great Bloggers Bake Off – how could I resist making something?!

This is a bit of a short post as I’m not sharing the recipe because I didn’t feel the one I used worked particularly well – the pastry was too crumbly and prone to holes and breakage, and the filling very nearly didn’t set at all! Still it went down very well at dinner – you can’t go far wrong with this much chocolate 🙂

The pastry was an enriched dough, with sugar, cocoa powder and an egg yolk added to the normal butter-flour-water base.

I was pleased to get it all into the tin in one piece…

… but it didn’t come out quite as in tact!

I didn’t want the filling to leak out or ruin the crispness of the pastry, so used a thin coat of melted dark chocolate over the cooled pastry to create a tight seal.

Once this was set the filling was quite simple – a tin of Carnation caramel (much easier than making your own from a can of condensed milk), mixed with some melted dark chocolate, and layered up over some thinly sliced bananas. I think the issue with the caramel not setting was due to too much stirring to combined the chocolate. If I make this again I’ll boil it up a little with some more butter and sugar to make a thicker caramel that will set firmly.

To finish I used some simple chocolate icing (cocoa, icing sugar milk), drizzled in lines and feathered with a cocktail stick. Easy but effective!

I used the same chocolate icing to pipe some swirls around the exposed edge of the pastry case, which neatened up the final look (and hid the cracks where I’d patched the pastry together!)

As I say not one of my favourite recipes but it still went down well – with that much chocolate you can’t go wrong!

You can find out more about the Great Bloggers Bake Off by clicking on the link below.

This week’s Great Bloggers Bake Off comes thanks to the lovely people at Stork, who sent me a voucher to try out their new Stork with butter. It’s a thank you not just for providing the butter – but also making me get into the kitchen and make something. Had I not had this review to write I would very likely have not contributed… again!

This week was patisserie week on the Great British Bake Off. I really did feel for Paul and his not knowing how to make a genoise sponge for the technical challenge, I’d have been in exactly the same boat having never made one before. And it’s not one you’d easily work out for yourself – whipped eggs and melted butter are not the normal start for a sponge!

The technical challenge was the one that took my fancy this week – however rather than the mokatines the bakers in the tent had to tackle, I opted for Mary Berry’s other recipe for these little patisserie squares – the chocolate version. The recipe is very similar and the method identical – using melted chocolate instead of coffee extract for the creme buerre (fancy buttercream to you and me) filling, and soft chocolate icing topping.

In a bit of a risky move – having never made a genoise before – I made a bit of a crazy decision to adapt it to gluten free. Low and behold, it worked perfectly! The adaptation was actually quite simple – instead of the recommend 65g of flour, I used 50g of gluten free flour and an extra 5g of cornflour. I won’t recount the full recipe but you can find it in Mary’s Baking Bible, or online in many places.

The Stork with Butter was also great for using with this – it melted down to a lovely creamy texture, with a rich buttery taste. Perfect for the richness that is needed in patisserie.

Once the sponge was cooled and cut into squares I actually found the two icings quite easy to make. It was the assembly and piping that was rather more of a faff!

The buttercream was quite difficult to spread on the delicate sponge, so it was more of a splodge and hope for the best. Once the two halves were pressed together it was easier to neaten up round the sides. Then just the not-so-simple task of piping tiny rosettes round the side of each square.

And finally – the smooth chocolate icing. I’d refrigerated the cake squares so the buttercream rosettes had chance to firm up a little – meaning they formed quite a good barrier to hold the top icing on. I also had to use a little paintbrush to ensure it got into all the corners!

And with a final blast in the fridge, the chocolatines were finished!

Although not perfectly neat I was still really pleased with how they turned out – and they passed the Mary and Paul test of having a neat layer of filling in the middle!

They had a lovely creamy, smooth richness, as any good patisserie should, and the Stork with Butter was a perfect base to use for this. I’d be more than happy to use it in my baking again.

Thanks again to Stork for supplying the ingredients and to Jenny for being as ever a great organiser for the Great Bloggers Bake Off. Click on the image below to find out more and look at what the other bakers have been up to this week.

Disclaimer: The Stork with Butter was provided to me for the purposes of this post. The reviews, opinions and baking however are all my own.

Week five of 2015’s Great Bloggers Bake-Off (although only the second for me), and the lovely people at Tesco Real Food got in touch to ask if I’d bake something for free-from week if they provided the ingredients. How could I refuse! Being diagnosed with a gluten intolerance last Christmas, you’ll have noticed a steady increase in gluten-free recipes this year, and I was so pleased to see GBBO recognising that there are people out there who need to use different methods an ingredients in their baking.

This bake started out as a gluten-free snack one evening after work. Only later did I realise it’s also dairy-free and (added) sugar-free as well – ticking off all off the weeks challenges in one batch of tasty muffins!

These muffins actually border on healthy due to the high fruit and nut content, and are perfect for an on-the-go breakfast, or to curb those mid-morning munchies.

All my ingredients came from Tesco – and although they don’t make their own gluten free flour, they do stock Doves Farm which is my personal favourite, it’s a great base for so many recipes.

The great thing about this recipe is that it’s so versatile – you can add or omit most things as long as you keep the basics at the same quantities – bananas, eggs, oil, milk/water and dry ingredients (flour/oats/ground almonds & bicarb). They’d very easily work as nut-free (replace the ground almonds with more gf flour and omit the ones on top); you can omit the dried mixed fruits if you’re not a fan; or add some chocolate chips for a sweeter treat!

Method
– In a large bowl, mix together the apricots, ginger, mixed fruit, flour, oats, almonds and bicarbonate of soda. Mix well so that all the little pieces of fruit/ginger are coated in flour, this will stop them sinking during making
– In a separate bowl, mash the bananas and beat together with the milk, oil, and eggs
– Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones and mix until all combined
– Grease a 12-hole muffin tin. I use cake release spray – you can also get this in Tesco – but oil would work too. Use a pastry brush to make sure the sides, corners and bottom are well greased, as it’s quite a sticky mixture.
– Divide the mixture between the 12 holes and sprinkle the flaked almonds over the top
– Bake at 180 °C for 12-15 minutes, until the tops are springy to the touch and the muffins are slightly golden at the edges

The apricot jam glaze is entirely optional (and slightly anti the sugar-free part of the challenge), but does add a lovely finish to the tops of the muffins. Tesco do stock a reduced-sugar jam for the particularly health conscious!

– As soon as the muffins are removed from the oven, leave them in the tin and prick the tops all over with the very tip of a sharp knife. You want about 15-20 tiny holes per muffin
– Heat the apricot jam in the microwave or a saucepan with 25ml of water, until you have a smooth liquid (this should only take a minute or two). Drizzle the glaze over the top of each muffin a little at a time, until it’s all used up
– Leave the muffins to cool completely in the tin. Once cool, they should come out easily (if you greased the tin well enough!), if not, run a sharp knife around the edges, turn the tray upside down, and gently tap the bottom

Inside the muffins are moist and oh-so-good! Keep them in an airtight container, and because of the fresh banana they should be eaten within a few days – although they certainly don’t last that long in our house.

You can find out more about the Great Bloggers Bake Off 2015 by clicking here, and more about Tesco Real Food by clicking here.

A big thank you to Tesco for providing me with the ingredients for this bake. The opinions and recipe however are entirely my own.

One of my twitter followers thoughtfully asked last week if I was doing the Great Bloggers Bake Off this year – and sadly my answer was no, as I don’t have the time at the moment (which may be evident from the distinct slowdown in blog posts!)

However – it got me thinking, I have got some posts waiting to be uploaded that tie in with some of the GBBO weeks… so why not tie them in? Better to part-partake than not at all!

So the first of my posts is for Desserts Week. I loved last nights show – would love to have a go at a Windtorte at some point, and baked cheesecakes? Hello! Nadiya’s fizzy pop cheesecake stack was absolutely inspired.

This recipe is great for the summer as there are absolutely no ovens involved. That’s right, no overheating the kitchen when you’re already struggling to maintain a normal body temperature. And who doesn’t love their own little pot portion? Although one is never enough!

The glass ramekins you may recognise from a popular brand of rather amazing desserts, but any small bowls would be suitable. The recipe will make 6 of this size, adjust up or down if your containers are bigger/smaller.

Crush the biscuits and press firmly into the base of the ramekins. Cover with clingfilm and refrigerate while you prepare the middle layer.

Beat together the cream cheese, yoghurt, sugar, lemon and vanilla until well combined.

Remove the ramekins from the fridge and carefully spoon the cheese mixture onto the biscuit base. Try and avoid it splashing up the sides, especially if you have glass bowls/ramekins, as it will spoil the finished look.

Return to the fridge for another 30 minutes.

Make up the jelly according to the instructions on the packet, and set aside to cool slightly.

Remove any stalks from the strawberries and slice in half. Carefully press into on top of the cheese mixture, before pouring the jelly over the top.

Refrigerate until the jelly has set and serve as soon as you’re ready – I wouldn’t recommend making more than a day in advance as the layers will start to merge together and go a bit sticky.

Inside… crunchy, creamy, sweet and fruity all in one mouthful. I told you one wasn’t enough!

You can find more about Great Bloggers Bake Off by clicking here – scroll down and there are weekly links to all the yumminess that has been made!

Like this:

Well it has come to the final week of #greatbloggersbakeoff2014 – and here is my final showstopper!

I wanted to challenge myself, as the bakers had done in the tent, so embarked on the very final challenge of the series. This was the pièce montée – a decorative celebration or centrepiece cake, featuring different baking elements, decorations, and techniques.

Well this certainly was a learning experience for me – planning shapes and sizes and doing things in the right order are just two points to note! Nevertheless, everything came together to create, kind of, my ferris wheel pièce montée (what do you mean you can’t see it!)

The different elements I used were as follows:

– Ombre chocolate cake base (adapted from Nigella’s recipe), filled and covered with raspberry butter cream
– Macarons, decorated with a light dusting of edible glitter
– Chocolate and ginger biscuits (adapted from a Christmas gingerbread house recipe)
– Profiteroles, filled with raspberry cream and decorate with white chocolate
– A golden and red sugar decoration, to represent the wheel (simply made by creating a sugar syrup in a heavy bottomed pan)

The individual elements I was very pleased with – the putting together a little less so! I had not filled and iced my cake early enough, so it was not set enough by the time I came to build everything up, and things started to slide a little…
I had also vastly over-estimated the size of the sugar wheel, it was too large for the cake and dwarfed the profiteroles and biscuit behind!

Nevertheless, everything tasted good, and pulling it to pieces and eating was definitely the most fun part 🙂

Thank you to Jenny for hosting the GreatBloggersBakeOff again this year – it was great fun and I definitely learnt some new techniques, watch out for some more choux pastry coming soon!

What better theme to celebrate with, than big, sticky birthday cakes. I’d been wanting to try a checkerboard cake for a while, and this was the perfect opportunity.

I started off with three different flavoured round cakes, tinted with pastel colours to match the sprinkles I wanted to use on the outside. The peach-coloured cake was flavoured with Sugar and Crumbs raspberry ripple icing sugar, the green had the juice and zest of a small lime, and the yellow a couple of teaspoons of lemon juice. I baked them in foil trays as 1) I don’t have 3 tins of the same size and 2) I wanted to minimise on washing up!

Once cool, I scouted round the kitchen for suitable crockery to cut the circles. Posts I’d read online suggested cups, bowls, jam jars, but then had the brainwave of using my concentric circle cookie cutters. The largest and smallest were the perfect size to cut 3 even-thickness bands out of each cake.

A quick reorganisation later and I had 3 dart-board-esque cakes:

Using a vanilla buttercream, I layered up the three tiers…

… and gave the outside two good coats of icing, refrigerating in between.

After the second coat of buttercream, it was time for the sprinkles! And one of the trickier, stickier steps – rolling the sides of the cake in the bowl of hundreds and thousands. It took a bit of patching up but actually was quite effective, even if my kitchen was left covered in the sprinkles as well!

The top was much simpler, a final coat of buttercream with hundreds and thousands poured and smoothed over. There were quite literally hundreds and thousands of them too – two whole packs for the entire cake!

I’m really pleased with the way it turned out, although it does remind me a little of a giant liquorice allsort 🙂

Our cake club birthday party was a great feast of sugar and everything gooey and good, we gossiped for hours over tea and cake.

And the checkerboard looked great inside!

Or at least… what brief snaps I had time to take, before the cake-clubbers demolished the lot!

I’m entering this post into the #greatbloggersbakeoff2014 showstopper. This is not the last of my GBBO entries though – watch this space (and cross your fingers!) for a finale pièce montée in the next few days.

This post is also part of Celebration Cakes and Bakes – click the image for more info.

The semi-final of Great British Bake Off and indeed #greatbloggersbakeoff2014 – my kitchen will be distinctly less chaotic after the final this week.

This week I was caught up in the grilling frenzy that is the 20 layered Schichttorte. Developed from the traditional German Baumkuchen (tree cake), the cake is made by cooking thin layers of batter under the grill, to create the distinctive layered inside.

I followed the BBC recipe for my cake, although am a little dis-inclined to say that is Paul Hollywood’s as I’m certain he’s not a traditional German!

The recipe is certainly fitting for a technical challenge, starting with 10 eggs…

.

… and going through the stages of beating, sieving…

… whisking…

… and finally folding:

With the batter finished it was time to start layering up. Placing the bowl on the scales I calculated each layer should have about 50 grams worth, and barely covered the surface!

After a couple of minutes under the grill, it came out, resembling, well, a pancake!

The next layer and a little darker…

.. and the cats soon got to wonder what was going on in there.

I must admit I lost count of the layers around the 6 mark, as I was trying to do a million other things at once. I kept going until all the batter was used up, and finally reached the top.

A short while cooling and I was glad for it to come out in one piece, albeit looking slightly ombre…!

After all those layers the finishing and icing was surprisingly simple. A quick coat of apricot jam (to help the icing stick):

And a generous coating of dark chocolate glaze:

Finally, a finishing touch of piped white vanilla icing:

And the cake was finished! The sides I wasn’t particularly pleased with as the chocolate and icing didn’t stick particularly smoothly.

It was then rather a waiting game – I wanted the icing to set a little before slicing up, so put the cake in the fridge until it was ready to eat, and finally the moment of truth:

Hooray! I’m so pleased with the layers. And yes you can count them… there are in fact 22 🙂 Big slices were enjoyed and I was pleasantly surprised by the taste – a delicate light cake with a slightly lemon tang, and wonderfully complimented by the chocolate and vanilla icing.

So much excitement for the final this week! Who do you think will win? And more importantly, what on earth will they be challenged to bake this week?!

This week’s Great British Bake Off was Advanced Dough week – groan – when is it time for cakes! However once the doughnuts came round (no pun intended), I was positively drooling. How amazing were Luis’ cocktail ones?

We don’t own a deep-fat fryer but I found a great recipe for baked doughnuts which was seemed both healthier and easier. The dough is fat-free (unlike regular doughnuts), but still enriched with milk, egg, and a little sugar.

To fill and decorate
400g lemon curd – one batch, or one jar if you are buying it in
100g icing sugar
Crushed meringue pieces

– In a large bowl, mix together the flour, salt, yeast and sugar
– Beat the egg and add to the dry ingredients, before mixing in the milk and hot water
– Mix to a dough consistency, and knead until smooth and silky (5-6 minutes with an electric mixer, slightly longer by hand)
– Divide into 18-20 even balls and spread evenly on greased baking sheets. The dough balls do need to be spread well apart as they’ll expand rather a lot!
– Cover and place in a warm place until risen and doubled in size, about 45 minutes
– Bake in a hot oven – 200 degrees – for 10-12 minutes, until firm to the touch and golden. Set aside and leave to cool

– Once cool, fill each doughnut with around a teaspoon of lemon curd – a filling nozzle and piping bag worked perfectly for me
– Mix the icing sugar with a little water, and a teaspoon of lemon curd, to form a thin paste
– Lightly paint the glaze all over the doughnuts, placing on a wire rack to set. Sprinkle with the meringue pieces and leave to rest until dry.

A quite sticky bake in the end – but well worthwhile! The doughnuts had a wonderful sugary crunch on the outer, soft and light inside, and oozing with tangy lemon curd. I’ll definitely be trying some more doughnuts – perhaps some mini ones next time – any suggestions?

Find out more about #greatbloggersbakeoff2014 and take a look at this weeks other bakes here.

I have a confession to make. During last years bake-off, I failed at making choux pastry. 3 times. It was a Sunday afternoon and no matter what I did it wouldn’t go right!

This time, as part of the second pastry week of this year’s Great British Bake-Off and #greatbloggersbakeoff2014 , I was determined not to be beaten.

I used Paul Hollywood’s Chocolate Eclair recipeto the letter to avoid going wrong again – so won’t re-write it here. It’s definitely worth reading through a couple of times before you start so you know what’s ahead.

The lovely folks at Kerrygold sent me some butter to try, so this seemed a good place to start. Maybe the lower-fat butter blend I have as standard in the fridge was to blame for last year’s failure?

Being ultra-prepared, I got everything out, pre-whisked the eggs, greased the tray just like Paul said…

…and set about the choux pastry!

One of the main problems I find with making choux pastry is that it really doesn’t look like anything until it’s baked. The ‘cooking a ball of flour, butter and water dough’ is both unattractive and uninspiring in my book, but, what Paul says…!

Dough satisfactorily ball-like and shiny, I put it in a bowl and set aside to cool. Suddenly it dawned on me where I’d gone wrong last year. Those five little words, ‘leave to cool until tepid’, (or the lack of them in my reading), were entirely responsible for my downfall. Cue flashbacks to last year and trying to beat eggs in the hot saucepan only for them cook and scramble… it’s like something from an outakes show!

Cool and tepid, whisking the eggs in was happily much easier this time!

And a smooth shiny, paste-like dough, well seemed pretty good to me 🙂

All that was left was to pipe…

…and bake:

What a result! I was as pleased as punch, my first choux pastries and they were really rather marvellous 🙂

Next came the cream piping – rather simple but made much trickier in a warm kitchen, with the cream threatening to melt all the time. I don’t envy the bakers in that tent one bit!

And to top – I used Paul’s suggested chocolate topping for half the batch:

And feeling more confident, whipped up a quick caramel icing for the remaining batch:

Caramel icing
55g light brown sugar
25g butter
20ml cream or milk

– Melt together the butter and sugar
– Add the liquid and boil for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally
– Leave to cool and use once the icing reaches a spreadable consistency. If it over-sets you can easily re-heat to liquify it again

I finished both sets with a decorative drizzle of the other icing – chocolate on caramel, and caramel on chocolate.